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180 gram Black Virgin Vinyl with a free Download Code included!

Together, Bugge Wesseltoft and Henning Kraggerud put together a sparkling program of 16 pieces with connections to spring for "Last Spring", which is founded mostly on Norwegian folk music. With the duo recording Bugge Wesseltoft, the grand master of the synthesis of live electronics and jazz improvisation, now shows his more tranquil, classical side again. His partner Henning Kraggerud is one of the most successful solo violinists of his time, having played with the best orchestras - most recently with the Danish National Orchestra and the London Philharmonic Orchestra - and conductors in the most prestigious concert halls around the world. The title track is based on a theme from the great Nordic Romantic Edvard Grieg which is also apparent in many of the other tracks. Alongside folk songs like "Om Kvelden" and "Hei hu", also called upon are indigenous composers from various ages, largely unknown to us: from Anne Haavie, deceased in 1888, and Lars Søraas the Elder, to the Danish organist Otto Mortensen, who died in 1986 and the young singer and lyrist Øyonn Groven Myhren. Then there is also an improvisation on the baroque La Folia, the oldest melodic-harmonic compositional structure, and finally a rendition of Johannes Brahms' Lullaby. As the title intimates, "Last Spring" is a revisiting of spring. It is not an exulting, whirling awakening, but a sustained, minimalistic meditation, oriented strongly towards the details, the variance of the melodies, the breadth and beauty of the sound. It is based on the most perfect interaction possible: Wesseltoft's soft piano daubs melt like wax into the pizzicato melodies that Kraggerud entices out of his 1744 Guarneri violin, his Harald Lund viola and his unique six-stringed viola Concorda. This magical duo succeeds in gleaning new sound ideas and facets from spring, just as the original concept intended.

Track Listing